Kathy Chesser, a 22 year veteran of the library along with new director Jennifer Kozlowski, were on hand today to talk about many of the exciting programs offered by the Adrian District Library in addition to mentioning that the organization is soon to celebrate their 150th anniversary!
Kathy began by thanking the club for supporting their Summer Reading Program which has attracted over 200 kids each year encouraging them to read over their summer time off from school. March, Kathy said, is National Reading Month.
Jennifer Wrzesinski, who started last September replacing Shirley Ehnis who had worked there for over 40 years, then spoke and said that she'd most recently worked at a library in the Lansing area and in Marshall before that. This is her first "director" position and she is the 7th director in Adrian's 150 year history, she said.
The Adrian Library Association started in 1868. The original library was located in the current Lenawee Historical Museum on Church Street and was named after Andrew Carnegie. To commemorate the library's milestone anniversary, events will be planned monthly up until Sunday, August 26, she said, replete with an open house, band, cake & ice-cream, giveaways and a variety of different activities. Everyone is welcome to attend.
Kathy then went into a bit more detail about upcoming programs including their Cops & Kiddo program, Wild Swan Theater event, Summer Slide, Circus Workshop, Teen Read and other pre-school and elementary age programs that involve stories and crafts. Guest readers are invited to participate as well, she said, including Classroom Critters by Adrian resident Paul McCormick.
Kathy closed by telling us that one of the things our support has allowed her to do is purchase books she can give the children participating in the Summer Reading program. They are used to incentivize the kids to read. Over 500 books were given away last year, she said. "Each child gets a book when they sign up for the program and they get one when they completed their "reading log".
What the library offers, she concluded, is all about offering programs where kids can just go and have fun, Kathy said!